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Road Kill: Designing Good Web Pages.

November 8, 2006

Never mind the experts, never mind what you learned in design school, and never mind what your competitors do: put a stake in the ground and define the purpose of your web site and then make it deliver that functionality. Don't let that functionality get lost in layers of pretty design or unnecessary technology.

What defines a good web site? Have you ever been on a web site trying to do something that you were supposed to be able to do on that site and couldn't? That's not a good web site then. It doesn't matter how pretty it is, how much time went into the color scheme, or how efficient the JavaScript code is that they're using to make the pretty little rollover buttons, if I can't find what I need, then it's not a good web site, it's a bad web site.

What defines a bad web site? Ever been on a site that looked like a 3rd grader made it? Ugly font, strange color choices, images that were not very polished, plain links instead of fancy buttons and Flash animation? Did you find what you were looking for? Did you get the information you needed? If so, it's a good web site.

Functionality is more important than looks. People will not stay on a web site that is hard to use. They will not return to a web site that does not work like it should. Your web site can be functional and look good, all it takes is planning and possibly less work than you would have put forth on a more complex, overly done design.

Have you ever been driving down a back country road and have a deer run out in front of you? The deer just stands there staring at your headlights and he or she doesn't know which way go. Don't do this to your web site visitors. Don't present them with 103 choices and flashing lights, buzzers, and whistles when they land on your home page. Your visitors may never make the choices that you want or that you assume they will. Keep each page focused and simple. Don't make someone work to purchase something from you; it should be easy for them to send you their money.

One key to creating better web pages is to minimize the use of layout packages like Microsoft FrontPage, Adobe GoLive, or DreamWeaver and do more coding by hand. Learn enough HTML so that you can start a page in one of these layout packages (if necessary) and then finish and maintain the page in a text or HTML editor. Using this method, you'll understand your pages better. You'll know how they work, and can modify them faster. I've built a lot of sites and it's easier to modify and change the ones that I've coded by hand as opposed to the few that were built entirely in a layout package. Why? Because layout packages like FrontPage change over time. When you open a site you created in layout package "x" version "n" two years later in version "n+1" and it no longer looks like it should, you'll understand why I like to edit my own HTML! Or, when you spend hours trying to get something to line up correctly in a layout package and finally start looking at the HTML code and realize that it's a mess and redo it by hand in half the time without the problems, then you'll understand why I like to edit my own HTML! But the main reason is that once you understand and can edit HTML, it's easy to just do it by hand! Learn how with my online course www.WebSiteTrainingOnline.com.

If your site is supposed to sell something, then focus on selling. If it's an information site, then focus on providing information. If you want both, then maybe you should create two sites and link between them where necessary. Your goal should be clean, simple, and functional web pages that deliver to the end user the content or service that the web site was intended to provide.

Fred

About the Author

Fred Black is an experienced online business operator, programmer, web site developer, father, husband, musician, and songwriter. Visit his Internet Business Blog at: http://www.pqInternet.com.

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